Why did Dostoevsky's wife die? Female images in the works of F
He is recognized as a classic of literature and one of the best novelists of world significance. It is 195 years since the birth of Dostoevsky.
First love
Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky was born on November 11, 1821 in Moscow and was the second child in big family. His father, a doctor at the Moscow Mariinsky Hospital for the Poor, received the title of hereditary nobleman in 1828. Mother is from merchant family, a religious woman. From January 1838, Dostoevsky studied at the Main Engineering School. He suffered from the military atmosphere and drill, from disciplines alien to his interests and from loneliness. As his college friend, the artist Trutovsky, testified, Dostoevsky kept himself aloof, but amazed his comrades with his erudition, and a literary circle formed around him. Having served less than a year in the St. Petersburg engineering team, in the summer of 1844, Dostoevsky resigned with the rank of lieutenant, deciding to devote himself entirely to creativity.
In 1846, a new one appeared on the literary horizon of St. Petersburg. talented star- Fedor Dostoevsky. The young author’s novel “Poor People” creates a real sensation among the reading public. Dostoevsky, hitherto unknown to anyone, in an instant becomes a public person, for the honor of seeing whom famous people fight in their literary salon.
Most often Dostoevsky could be seen at the evenings at Ivan Panaev's, where the most famous writers and critics of that time: Turgenev, Nekrasov, Belinsky. However, it was not the opportunity to talk with his more venerable fellow writers that drew him there. young man. Sitting in the corner of the room, Dostoevsky, holding his breath, watched Panaev's wife, Avdotya. This was the woman of his dreams! Beautiful, smart, witty - everything about her excited his mind. In his dreams, confessing his ardent love, Dostoevsky, because of his timidity, was even afraid to speak to her again.
Avdotya Panaeva, who later left her husband for Nekrasov, was completely indifferent to the new visitor to her salon. “At first glance at Dostoevsky,” she writes in her memoirs, “it was clear that he was a terribly nervous and impressionable young man. He was thin, small, blond, with a sallow complexion; his small gray eyes somehow moved anxiously from object to object, and his pale lips twitched nervously.” How can she, the queen, pay attention to such a “handsome man” among these writers and counts!
Petrashevsky circle
One day, out of boredom, at the invitation of a friend, Fyodor dropped in for the evening at Petrashevsky’s circle. Young liberals gathered there, read French books banned by censorship and talked about how good it would be to live under republican rule. Cozy atmosphere Dostoevsky liked it, and although he was a convinced monarchist, he began to come to “Fridays”.
But these “tea parties” ended badly for Fyodor Mikhailovich. Emperor Nicholas I, having received information about the “Petrashevsky circle,” gave an order to arrest everyone. One night they came for Dostoevsky. First, six months of imprisonment in solitary confinement in the Peter and Paul Fortress, then the sentence - the death penalty, replaced by four years of prison with further service as a private.
The years that followed were some of the hardest in Dostoevsky's life. A nobleman by birth, he found himself among murderers and thieves who immediately disliked the “political”. “Every new arrival in the prison, two hours after arrival, becomes like everyone else,” he recalled. - Not so with a noble, with a nobleman. No matter how fair, kind, smart he may be, he will be hated and despised by everyone for years, by the whole mass.” But Dostoevsky did not break. On the contrary, he came out a completely different person. It was during penal servitude that knowledge of life, human characters, and the understanding that a person can combine good and evil, truth and lies, came together.
In 1854, Dostoevsky arrived in Semipalatinsk. Soon I fell in love. The object of his desires was the wife of his friend Maria Isaeva. This woman has felt deprived of both love and success all her life. Born into a fairly wealthy family of a colonel, she unsuccessfully married an official who turned out to be an alcoholic. Dostoevsky, throughout for long years who did not know female affection, it seemed that he had met the love of his life. He spends evening after evening at the Isaevs', listening to the drunken eloquence of Maria's husband just to be near his beloved.
In August 1855, Isaev dies. Finally, the obstacle was removed, and Dostoevsky proposed to the woman he loved. Maria, who had a growing son and debts for her husband’s funeral, had no choice but to accept her admirer’s offer. On February 6, 1857, Dostoevsky and Isaeva got married. First wedding night An incident occurred that became an omen of the failure of this family union. In Dostoevsky, due to nervous tension I had an epileptic attack. The body convulsing on the floor, the foam flowing from the corners of his mouth - the picture she saw forever instilled in Maria a shade of some kind of disgust for her husband, for whom she already had no love.
Conquered peak
In 1860, Dostoevsky, thanks to the help of friends, received permission to return to St. Petersburg. There he met Apollinaria Suslova, whose features can be seen in many of the heroines of his works: in Katerina Ivanovna and Grushenka from The Brothers Karamazov, and in Polina from The Player, and in Nastasya Filippovna from The Idiot. Apollinaria made an indelible impression: a slender girl “with big gray-blue eyes, with the regular features of an intelligent face, with his head thrown back proudly, framed by magnificent braids. In her low, somewhat slow voice and in the whole demeanor of her strong, tightly built body there was a strange combination of strength and femininity.”
Their romance, which began, turned out to be passionate, stormy and uneven. Dostoevsky either prayed to his “angel”, lay at her feet, or behaved like a brute and a rapist. He was either enthusiastic, sweet, or capricious, suspicious, hysterical, shouting at her in some nasty, thin woman's voice. In addition, Dostoevsky’s wife became seriously ill, and he could not leave her, as Polina demanded. Gradually, the lovers' relationship reached a dead end.
They decided to leave for Paris, but when Dostoevsky arrived there, Apollinaria told him: “You’re a little late.” She fell passionately in love with a certain Spaniard, who, by the time Dostoevsky arrived, abandoned the Russian beauty that had bored him. She sobbed into Dostoevsky's vest, threatened to commit suicide, and he, stunned by the unexpected meeting, calmed her down and offered her brotherly friendship. Here Dostoevsky urgently needs to go to Russia - his wife Maria is dying. He visits the sick woman, but not for long - it’s very hard to watch: “Her nerves are extremely irritated. The chest is bad, withered like a matchstick. Horror! It’s painful and hard to watch.”
His letters contain a combination of sincere pain, compassion and petty cynicism. “My wife is dying, literally. Her suffering is terrible and resonates with me. The story drags on. Here's another thing: I'm afraid that my wife's death will happen soon, and then a break from work will be necessary. If it weren’t for this break, I think I would have finished the story.”
In the spring of 1864 there was a “break in work” - Masha died. Looking at her withered corpse, Dostoevsky writes in his notebook: “Masha is lying on the table... It is impossible to love a person as yourself according to the commandment of Christ.” Almost immediately after the funeral, he offers Apollinaria his hand and heart, but is refused - for her Dostoevsky was a conquered peak.
“For me, you are lovely, and there is no one like you”
Soon Anna Snitkina appeared in the writer’s life; she was recommended as Dostoevsky’s assistant. Anna perceived this as a miracle - after all, Fyodor Mikhailovich had long been her favorite writer. She came to him every day, and sometimes deciphered shorthand notes at night. “Talking to me in a friendly manner, Fyodor Mikhailovich every day revealed to me some sad picture of her life,” Anna Grigorievna would later write in her memoirs. “Deep pity involuntarily crept into my heart when he talked about difficult circumstances from which he, apparently, never came out, and could not come out.”
The novel "The Gambler" was completed on October 29. The next day Fyodor Mikhailovich celebrated his birthday. Anna was invited to the celebration. As he said goodbye, he asked permission to meet her mother to thank her for her magnificent daughter. By that time, he had already realized that Anna had fallen in love with him, although she expressed her feeling only silently. The writer also liked her more and more.
The few months from engagement to wedding were pure bliss. “It was not physical love, not passion. It was rather adoration, admiration for a person so talented and possessing such high spiritual qualities. The dream of becoming his life partner, sharing his labors, making his life easier, giving him happiness - took possession of my imagination,” she would later write.
Anna Grigorievna and Fyodor Mikhailovich got married on February 15, 1867. The happiness remained, but the serenity was completely gone. Anna had to use all her patience, perseverance and courage. There were problems with money, huge debts. Her husband suffered from depression and epilepsy. Convulsions, seizures, irritability - all this fell upon her in full. And that was only half the story.
Dostoevsky's pathological passion for gambling is a terrible passion for roulette. Everything was at stake: family savings, Anna's dowry, and even Dostoevsky's gifts to her. Losses ended in periods of self-flagellation and ardent repentance. The writer begged his wife for forgiveness, and then it all started all over again.
The writer’s stepson Pavel, the son of Maria Isaeva, who actually ran the house, was not distinguished by a meek disposition, and was dissatisfied with his father’s new marriage. Pavel constantly tried to prick the new mistress. He sat firmly on his stepfather’s neck, like other relatives. Anna realized that the only way out was to go abroad. Dresden, Baden, Geneva, Florence. It was against the backdrop of these divine landscapes that their real rapprochement took place, and their affection turned into a serious feeling. They often quarreled and made up. Dostoevsky began to show unreasonable jealousy. “For me, you are lovely, and there is no one like you. And every person with a heart and taste should say this if he takes a closer look at you - that’s why I’m sometimes jealous of you,” he said.
And while staying in Baden-Baden, where they spent their honeymoon, the writer lost again in a casino. After that, he sent a note to his wife at the hotel: “Help me, they’ve come wedding ring" Anna meekly complied with this request.
They spent four years abroad. Joys gave way to sorrows and even tragedies. In 1868, their first daughter, Sonechka, was born in Geneva. She left this world three months later. This was a big shock for Anna and her husband. A year later, their second daughter, Lyuba, was born in Dresden.
Returning to St. Petersburg, they spent a significant part of their time in a romantically secluded Staraya Russa. He dictated, she took shorthand. The children were growing up. In 1871, a son, Fedor, was born in St. Petersburg, and in 1875, a son, Alyosha, was born in Staraya Russa. Three years later, Anna and her husband again had to endure a tragedy - in the spring of 1878, three-year-old Alyosha died of an epileptic seizure.
Returning to St. Petersburg, they did not dare to stay in the apartment, where everything reminded them of their deceased son, and settled at the famous address - Kuznechny Lane, building 5. Anna Grigorievna’s room turned into an office business woman. She managed everything: she was Dostoevsky’s secretary and stenographer, was involved in the publication of his works and the book trade, managed all financial affairs in the house, and raised children.
The relative calm was short-lived. Epilepsy has subsided, but new diseases have appeared. And then there are family disputes over inheritance. Fyodor Mikhailovich's aunt left him the Ryazan estate, stipulating the payment of sums of money to his sisters. But Vera Mikhailovna, one of the sisters, demanded that the writer give up his share in favor of the sisters.
After a stormy showdown, Dostoevsky's blood started pouring down his throat. The year was 1881, Anna Grigorievna was only 35 years old. She didn't believe in it until the very end. imminent death husband “Fyodor Mikhailovich began to console me, telling me dear sweet words, thanked for the happy life he lived with me. He entrusted the children to me, said that he believed me and hoped that I would always love and take care of them. Then he told me the words that a rare husband could say to his wife after fourteen years of marriage: “Remember, Anya, I have always loved you dearly and have never cheated on you, even mentally,” she will remember later. Two days later he was gone.
In the work of any writer there is always something that inspires him and predetermines the themes in his works. Love is always a pressing topic that is revealed most vividly, since every person has experienced this multifaceted feeling. But what it will be: tragic or joyful is not a matter of chance, but of the personal life of the author himself. Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky was a timid and very dreamy man; he had to visualize and sort out pictures of love in his fantasies rather than experience many affairs and romances in reality. His dreams became real only in three cases, which we will talk about in this article.
She was the most honest, most noble woman I have known in my entire life.
Dostoevsky met Maria Isaeva and her husband at the age of 33. The blond girl had beauty, a strong mind and, most importantly, a passionate and lively nature. But she didn’t have love with her alcoholic husband. He soon died, and Dostoevsky had a chance to compete for the beauty’s heart, which he, of course, took advantage of. In November, after six months of courtship, Fyodor finally decides to propose marriage, they get married.
Either Maria did not have time to move away from her feelings for her husband after his death, or Dostoevsky was not the hero of her novel, but great love she did not experience, which cannot be said about him. The question arises, why did you still go down the aisle? And the answer is quite simple: the woman had a child in her arms, whom it was extremely difficult to feed alone. It was also beneficial that in the fall of 1858 Fyodor Mikhailovich received permission to publish the magazine “Time” and earned a good fee. The spouses did not coincide either in character or in feelings towards each other, because of this there were constant exhausting quarrels that drove one side and the other.
On April 15, 1964, a woman dies painfully from consumption. Her husband nursed her until her last day. Despite the quarrels, he was always grateful to her for herself and the feelings that he experienced. In addition, he took upon himself the responsibility of caring for her son, whom he provided for even when he grew up.
Appolinaria Suslova
I still love her, I love her very much, but I wouldn’t want to love her anymore. She's not worth that kind of love. I feel sorry for her because I foresee that she will forever be unhappy.
When Fyodor Mikhailovich finally returned to the capital, he began to lead an active lifestyle, move in the circles of enlightened youth and attend cultural events, where he met a 22-year-old student. It should be noted that Dostoevsky always had a great passion for young girls. Polina was young, charming and witty, she had everything that attracted the writer, and her age was a big plus. Full set. For her, he was the first man and her most adult love. The romance began while Maria Isaeva was living out her last days. That is why the union of Fyodor and Polina was a secret, and while one side sacrificed everything for the other, the other, hiding behind a sick wife, only accepted, without giving anything in return. But, nevertheless, he loved Polina, was attached to his wife, and this made it difficult for him to lead a double life.
But, casting aside doubts, Dostoevsky agrees to go on vacation in the summer with Polina, but in view of his passionate love to gambling, is constantly delayed. Soon the young beast cannot stand it and gives the gentleman a moral slap in the face with the news that she has fallen in love with another and, they say, there is no longer any need for him. The executioner and the victim change places, and the writer, loving her a little less than she does, begins to burn with passion at the mere thought that he has lost her.
After Maria's death, he tries for some time to bring her back, but gets turned around. Polina behaves coldly towards him, although nothing worked out with her new lover. As a result, it was worth guessing that these people ran away forever, and according to sources, Polina was unhappy in her personal life because of her domineering character.
Anna Snitkina
Remember, Anya, I have always loved you dearly and have never betrayed you, even mentally.
After the death of Maria and brother Mikhail, left in large debts, Dostoevsky receives an offer to write a novel for a handsome sum. He agrees, but understands that he simply won’t have time to write such a volume within the given time frame and takes a stenographer as his assistant. While working on the work, Fyodor and Anna become closer and closer, revealing their best sides to each other. And soon he realizes that he is in love, but due to his modesty and dreaminess, he is afraid to open up to the beautiful lady. And so he tells a story he invented about an old man who fell in love with a young beauty, and asks, as if by chance, what Anya would do in that girl’s place? But Anya, as it should have already been noted, was a smart young lady and understood what the “old man” was hinting at, and replied that she would love him to the end. As a result, the lovers got married.
But their family life was not as smooth as it might seem. Dostoevsky's family did not accept her, and her new relatives plotted various intrigues for her. Living in such an environment turns out to be painfully difficult, and Anya asks Fyodor to go abroad. Actually, little good came out of this venture either, because it was there, with the spouse, that his main passion - gambling. But the woman loves him very much and understands that she will not leave him. Soon they return to St. Petersburg, and the couple finally begins to have a bright streak. He works on numerous works, and she is his support and support, always nearby and still loves him dearly. In 1881, Dostoevsky dies, and Anna, even after his death, continues to remain faithful, devoting her life to serving his name.
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In Dostoevsky's novels we see many women. These women are different. With “Poor People,” the theme of a woman’s fate begins in Dostoevsky’s work. Most often, they are not financially secure, and therefore defenseless. Many of Dostoevsky’s women are humiliated (Alexandra Mikhailovna, with whom Netochka Nezvanova, Netochka’s mother, lived). And women themselves are not always sensitive towards others: Varya is somewhat selfish, the heroine of “White Nights” is unconsciously selfish, there are also simply predatory, evil, heartless women (the princess from “Netochka Nezvanova”). He does not ground them or idealize them. The only women Dostoevsky does not have are happy ones. But no and happy men. No and happy families. Dostoevsky's works expose the difficult life of all those who are honest, kind, and warm-hearted.
In Dostoevsky's works, all women are divided into two groups: women of calculation and women of feeling. In “Crime and Punishment” we have a whole gallery of Russian women: the prostitute Sonya, Katerina Ivanovna and Alena Ivanovna killed by life, Lizaveta Ivanovna killed with an ax.
The image of Sonya has two interpretations: traditional and new, given by V. Ya. Kirpotin. According to the first, Christian ideas are embodied in the heroine, according to the second, she is the bearer of folk morality. Embodied in Sonya folk character in her undeveloped “childish” stage, and the path of suffering forces her to evolve according to the traditional religious scheme - towards the holy fool - it is not for nothing that she is so often compared with Lizaveta.
Sonya, who in her short life had already endured all imaginable and inconceivable suffering and humiliation, managed to preserve moral purity clarity of mind and heart. No wonder Raskolnikov bows to Sonya, saying that he bows to all human grief and suffering. Her image absorbed all the world's injustice, the world's sorrow. Sonechka speaks on behalf of all the “humiliated and insulted.” Just such a girl, with such life story, with such an understanding of the world, was chosen by Dostoevsky to save and purify Raskolnikov.
Her inner spiritual core, which helps preserve moral beauty, and her boundless faith in goodness and in God amaze Raskolnikov and make him think for the first time about the moral side of his thoughts and actions.
But along with her saving mission, Sonya is also a “punishment” for the rebel, constantly reminding him with her entire existence of what she has done. “Is it really possible that a person is a louse?!” - these words of Marmeladova planted the first seeds of doubt in Raskolnikov. It was Sonya, who, according to the writer, embodied the Christian ideal of goodness, could withstand and win the confrontation with the anti-human idea of Rodion. She fought with all her heart to save his soul. Even when at first Raskolnikov avoided her in exile, Sonya remained faithful to her duty, her belief in purification through suffering. Faith V God was her only support; it is possible that this image embodied the spiritual quest of Dostoevsky himself.
Thus, in the novel “Crime and Punishment” the author assigns one of the main places to the image of Sonechka Marmeladova, who embodies both world grief and divine, unshakable faith in the power of good. Dostoevsky on behalf of “ eternal Sonechka” preaches the ideas of kindness and compassion, which constitute the unshakable foundations of human existence.
In “The Idiot” the woman of calculation is Varya Ivolgina. But the main focus here is on two women: Aglaya and Nastasya Filippovna. They have something in common, and at the same time they are different from each other. Myshkin believes that Aglaya is “extremely” good-looking, “almost like Nastasya Filippovna, although her face is completely different.” In general, they are beautiful, each with their own face. Aglaya is beautiful, smart, proud, pays little attention to the opinions of others, and is dissatisfied with the way of life in her family. Nastasya Filippovna is different. Of course, this is also a restless, rushing woman. But her tossing is dominated by submission to fate, which is unfair to her. The heroine, following others, convinced herself that she was a fallen, low woman. Being captive of popular morality, she even calls herself a street person, wants to appear worse than she is, and behaves eccentrically. Nastasya Filippovna is a woman of feeling. But she is no longer capable of love. Her feelings have burned out, and she loves “only her shame.” Nastasya Filippovna has beauty, with the help of which you can “turn the world upside down.” Hearing about this, she says: “But I gave up the world.” She could, but she doesn't want to. Around her there is a “commotion” in the houses of the Ivolgins, Epanchins, Trotsky, she is pursued by Rogozhin, who competes with Prince Myshkin. But she's had enough. She knows the value of this world and therefore refuses it. For in the world she meets people either higher or lower than her. She doesn’t want to be with either one or the other. She, in her understanding, is unworthy of the former, and the latter are unworthy of her. She refuses Myshkin and goes with Rogozhin. This is not the end yet. She will rush between Myshkin and Rogozhin until she dies under the latter’s knife. Her beauty did not change the world. “The world has ruined beauty.”
Sofia Andreevna Dolgorukaya, Versilov’s common-law wife, mother of the “teenager,” is a highly positive female image created by Dostoevsky. The main quality of her character is feminine meekness and therefore “insecurity” against the demands placed on her. In the family, she devotes all her strength to caring for her husband, Versilov, and her children. It doesn’t even occur to her to protect herself from the demands of her husband and children, from their injustice, their ungrateful inattention to her concerns about their comfort. Complete self-oblivion is characteristic of her. In contrast to the proud, proud and vindictive Nastasya Filippovna, Grushenka, Ekaterina Ivanovna, Aglaya, Sofia Andreevna is humility incarnate. Versilov says that she is characterized by “humility, irresponsibility” and even “humiliation,” referring to Sofia Andreevna’s origins from the common people.
What was sacred for Sofia Andreevna, for which she would be willing to endure and suffer? What was holy for her was that highest thing that the Church recognizes as holy - without the ability to express church faith in judgments, but having it in her soul, holistically embodied in the image of Christ. She expresses her beliefs, as is typical to the common people, in short, specific statements.
Firm faith in the all-encompassing love of God and in Providence, thanks to which there are no meaningless accidents in life, is the source of Sofia Andreevna’s strength. Her strength is not Stavrogin’s proud self-affirmation, but her unselfish, unchanging attachment to what is truly valuable. Therefore, her eyes, “rather large and open, always shone with a quiet and calm light”; the expression on her face “would even be cheerful if she didn’t worry often.” The face is very attractive. In the life of Sofia Andreevna, so close to holiness, there was a grave guilt: six months after her wedding with Makar Ivanovich Dolgoruky, she became interested in Versilov, surrendered to him and became his common-law wife. Guilt always remains guilt, but when condemning it, one must take into account mitigating circumstances. Getting married as an eighteen-year-old girl, she did not know what love was, fulfilling her father’s will, and walked down the aisle so calmly that Tatyana Pavlovna “called her a fish then.”
In life, each of us meets holy people, whose modest asceticism is invisible to outsiders and is not sufficiently appreciated by us; however, without them, the bonds between people would fall apart and life would become unbearable. Sofia Andreevna belongs precisely to the number of such uncanonized saints. Using the example of Sofia Andreevna Dolgorukaya, we found out what kind of woman Dostoevsky had feelings for.
“Demons” depicts the image of Dasha Shatova, ready for self-sacrifice, as well as the proud, but somewhat cold Liza Tushina. In fact, there is nothing new in these images. This has already happened. The image of Maria Lebyadkina is not new either. A quiet, affectionate dreamer, a semi-or completely crazy woman. New in something else. For the first time, Dostoevsky brought out the image of an anti-woman here with such completeness. Here Maye Shatova arrives from the west. She knows how to juggle words from the dictionary of deniers, but she has forgotten that the first role of a woman is to be a mother. The following stroke is characteristic. Before giving birth, Mag1e says to Shatov: “It has begun.” Not understanding, he clarifies: “What started?” Mapa’s response: “How should I know? Do I really know anything here?” A woman knows what she might not know, and does not know what she simply cannot not know. She has forgotten her job and is doing someone else's. Before birth, when great secret Upon the appearance of a new creature, this woman shouts: “Oh, damn everything in advance!”
Another anti-woman is not a woman in labor, but a midwife, Arina Virginskaya. For her, the birth of a person is further development body. In Virginskaya, however, the feminine has not completely died. So, after a year of living with her husband, she gives herself to Captain Lebyadkin. Has the feminine won? No. I gave up because of a principle I read from books. This is how the narrator says about her, Virginsky’s wife: his wife, and all the ladies, were of the latest convictions, but it all came out somewhat rudely to them, it was here that there was “an idea that found its way onto the street,” as Stepan once put it Trofimovich has a different point. They all took books and, according to the first rumor from the progressive corners of our capital, they were ready to throw anything out the window, as long as they were advised to throw it away. Here too, during the birth of Mag1e, this anti-woman, apparently having learned from the book that children should be raised by anyone other than the mother, tells her: “Yes, and tomorrow I’ll send you the child to an orphanage, and then to the village to be raised, that's the end of it. And then you get better and get to work doing reasonable work.”
These were women who were sharply contrasted with Sofia Andreevna and Sonechka Marmeladova.
All Dostoevsky's women are somewhat similar to each other. But in each subsequent work, Dostoevsky adds new features to the images already known to us.
Dostoevsky's second wife, memoirist, publisher, bibliographer. She was born into the family of a petty St. Petersburg official, Grigory Ivanovich Snitkin, who was a great admirer of Dostoevsky’s talent, and thanks to her father, Anna Grigorievna fell in love with the writer’s work in her early youth. Anna Grigorievna’s mother is a Russified Swede of Finnish origin, from whom she inherited neatness, composure, a desire for order, and determination. And yet, the main, decisive factor that predetermined Anna Grigorievna’s life feat was the life-giving air of the late 1850s and early 1860s. in Russia, when a stormy wave of freedom-loving aspirations swept across the country, when young people dreamed of getting an education and achieving material independence. In the spring of 1858, Netochka Snitkina successfully graduated from St. Anna's School, and in the fall she entered the second grade of the Mariinsky Girls' Gymnasium. After graduating from high school with a silver medal, A.G. Snitkina entered the Pedagogical Courses, but was unable to complete them due to the serious illness of her father, who insisted that she attend at least shorthand courses. After the death of his father (1866) financial situation the Snitkin family's situation worsened, and then Anna Grigorievna had to put her shorthand knowledge into practice. She was sent to help the writer Dostoevsky on October 4, 1866.
Her nature always demanded the worship of something lofty and holy (hence her attempt at the age of thirteen to enter a Pskov monastery), and even before October 4, 1866, Dostoevsky became so lofty and holy for her. A few months before her death, she admitted that she loved Dostoevsky even before meeting him. On the day when the stenographer came to help Dostoevsky, twenty-six days remained before the deadline for the novel “The Gambler,” and it existed only in rough notes and plans, and if Dostoevsky had not submitted the novel “The Gambler” to F. by November 1, 1866. T. Stellovsky, then he would lose for nine years in favor of a prudent publisher the rights to all his literary works. With the help of Anna Grigorievna, Dostoevsky accomplished a literary feat: in twenty-six days he created the novel “The Player” in ten printed sheets. On November 8, 1866, Netochka Snitkina again came to Dostoevsky to agree on work on the last part and epilogue of Crime and Punishment (due to The Gambler, Dostoevsky interrupted work on it). And suddenly Dostoevsky started talking about a new novel, main character whom - an elderly and sick artist who has experienced a lot, who has lost family and friends - meets a girl, Anya. Half a century later, Anna Grigorievna recalled: “Put yourself in her place,” he said in a trembling voice. “Imagine that this artist is me, that I confessed my love to you and asked you to be my wife. Tell me, what would you answer me?” Fyodor Mikhailovich's face expressed such embarrassment, such heartache that I finally realized that this was not easy. literary conversation and that I would deal a terrible blow to his vanity and pride if I gave an evasive answer. I looked at the excited face of Fyodor Mikhailovich, so dear to me, and said:
“I would answer you that I love you and will love you all my life!”
And she kept her promise.
But after the wedding, Anna Grigorievna had to endure the same horror that the writer’s first wife experienced ten years ago. From excitement and drinking champagne, Dostoevsky had two seizures in one day. In 1916, Anna Grigorievna confessed to the writer and critic A.A. Izmailov: “...I remember the days of our life together as about days of great, undeserved happiness. But sometimes I redeemed him with great suffering. Fyodor Mikhailovich’s terrible illness threatened to destroy all our well-being any day... This disease, as you know, can neither be prevented nor cured. All I could do was unbutton his collar and take his head in my hands. But to see your beloved face, blue, distorted, with engorged veins, to realize that he was suffering and you could not help him in any way - this was such suffering with which, obviously, I had to atone for my happiness of being close to him ... "
Anna Grigorievna did everything in her power to change the situation - to go abroad on April 14, 1867, only with Dostoevsky, away from domestic troubles, from annoying and disgusted relatives, from careless St. Petersburg life, from all creditors and extortionists. “...I went, but then I left with death in my soul: I didn’t believe in foreign countries, that is, I believed that the moral influence of foreign countries would be very bad,” Dostoevsky told about his gloomy forebodings to his friend the poet A.N. Maikov. - One with a young creature, which with naive joy sought to share my wandering life; but I saw that in this naive joy there was a lot of inexperience and the first fever, and this confused and tormented me very much... My character is sick, and I foresaw that she would be tormented by me. (NB. True, Anna Grigorievna turned out to be stronger and deeper than I knew her...).”
Anna Grigorievna was in Europe for the first time, and indeed for the first time in her life she parted with her mother. “I consoled my mother that I would return in 3 months,” she wrote in one of the rough drafts of her memoirs, “in the meantime, I would write to her often. In the fall she promised the most in detail tell me about everything I see interesting abroad. And so as not to forget a lot, I promised to start notebook, into which I can write down, day after day, everything that happens to me. My word did not lag behind my deeds: I immediately bought a notebook at the station and from the next day I began to write down in shorthand everything that interested and occupied me. This book began my daily shorthand notes, which lasted about a year...”
This is how the diary of Dostoevsky’s wife arose - a unique phenomenon in memoir literature and an indispensable source for everyone involved in the biography of the writer (the first part of A.G. Dostoevskaya’s “Diary of 1867” was published by N.F. Belchikov in 1923; prepared and published by S.V. Zhitomirskaya at the Nauka publishing house in 1993 G.). Anna Grigorievna quickly became aware of how important it is to preserve for posterity everything connected with the name of Dostoevsky, and her foreign diary of 1867, originally conceived as a daily report exemplary daughter his mother, became a real literary monument. “At first I only wrote down my travel impressions and described our daily life,” recalls Anna Grigorievna. “But little by little I wanted to write down everything that so interested and captivated me about my dear husband: his thoughts, his conversations, his opinions about music, literature, etc.”
Diary of A.G. Dostoevskaya about her trip abroad in 1867 is a simple story about the life of newlyweds together, a testament to the tender attentiveness and strength of Dostoevsky’s late love. Anna Grigorievna realized that being Dostoevsky’s wife means not only experiencing the joy of intimacy genius man, but also be obliged to worthily bear all the hardships of life next to such a person, its heavy and joyful burden. And if, under the magnifying glass of his genius, every detail, the totality of which, in essence, consists of everyday life, grows gigantically, then this happens because the naked nerves of Dostoevsky, who suffered so much in his life, literally shuddered from the slightest touch of rude reality.
That is why the life of his companion often became a hagiography, and daily communication with Dostoevsky required real asceticism from Anna Grigorievna. Dostoevsky's honeymoon unexpectedly ends in disaster for the writer; again, as during his first trips abroad in 1862 and 1863, he is drawn into a ruthless and soulless roulette. A simple everyday motive - to win “capital” in order to pay off creditors, to live without need for several years, and most importantly - to finally get the opportunity to calmly work on one’s works - at the gambling table lost its original meaning. Impetuous, passionate, impetuous Dostoevsky gives himself over to unbridled excitement. Playing roulette becomes an end in itself. The passion for roulette for the sake of roulette itself, the game for the sake of its sweet torment, are explained by the character, the “nature” of the writer, who is inclined to often look into the dizzying abyss and challenge fate. Anna Grigorievna quickly unraveled the “mystery” of the writer’s roulette fever, noting that after a big loss, Dostoevsky began creative work and jotted down page after page. Anna Grigorievna does not complain when Dostoevsky pawns literally everything, even her wedding ring and earrings. She did not regret anything, because she knew:
But only the divine verb / Will touch the sensitive ear, / The poet’s soul will perk up, / Like an awakened eagle.
And then Dostoevsky’s indomitable craving for creativity will overcome all temptations, the cleansing flame of his conscience will flare up more strongly - “how I hurt for him, it’s terrible how he suffers” - in which his inner world is melted.
And so it happened, and Anna Grigorievna, with her non-resistance, managed to cure Dostoevsky of his passion. IN last time he played in 1871, before returning to Russia, in Wiesbaden. On April 28, 1871, Dostoevsky writes to Anna Grigorievna from Wiesbaden to Dresden: “A great thing has happened to me, the vile fantasy that tormented me for almost 10 years has disappeared. For ten years (or, better yet, since the death of my brother, when I was suddenly overwhelmed by debt), I kept dreaming of winning. I dreamed seriously, passionately. Now it's all over! This was quite the last time. Do you believe, Anya, that my hands are now untied; I was bound by the game, and now I will think about business and not dream about the game all night long, as happened in the past. And therefore, things will go better and faster, and God will bless you! Anya, keep your heart for me, don’t hate me and don’t stop loving me. Now that I am so renewed, let’s go together and I will make you happy!”
Dostoevsky kept his oath: he really left roulette forever (although he subsequently traveled alone four times for treatment abroad) and really made Anna Grigorievna happy. Dostoevsky understood perfectly well that he owed his liberation from the power of roulette primarily to Anna Grigorievna, her generous patience, forgiveness, courage and nobility. “I will remember this all my life and bless you, my angel, every time,” Dostoevsky wrote to Anna Grigorievna. - No, now it’s yours, yours inseparably, all yours. Until now, half of this damned fantasy belonged to me.”
But it was no coincidence that Anna Grigorievna felt that roulette stimulates literary work writer. Dostoevsky himself closely connected his creative impulses with “damned fantasy.” In a letter from Bains-Saxon, announcing his next loss, Dostoevsky thanks this misfortune, since it involuntarily prompted him to one saving thought: “... Although it seemed to me just now, I still have not yet finally figured out for myself this excellent a thought that came to me now! It came to me already at nine o’clock or so, when I had lost my game and went to wander along the alley (just as it happened in Wiesbaden when, after losing, I came up with an idea Crime and Punishment and thought about starting a relationship with Katkov...).”
The exhausting game of roulette contributed to the process of “merging” between Dostoevsky and Anna Grigorievna, and in letters of subsequent years, Dostoevsky would repeat that he felt “glued” to the family and could not bear even a short separation.
Dostoevsky becomes more and more accustomed to his young wife, more and more recognizes the richness of her nature and the remarkable traits of her character, and Anna Grigorievna, even after her husband’s next loss, writes in her shorthand diary of 1867: “At that time it seemed to me that I was endlessly I’m happy that I married him, and that this is probably what I should be punished for. Fedya, saying goodbye, told me that he loved me endlessly, that if they had told me that they would cut off his head for me, he would have allowed it now - he loves me so much that he will never forget my kind attitude in these minutes.”
Anna Grigorievna all her life considered her husband a sweet, simple and naive person who should be treated like a child. Dostoevsky himself saw precisely this as a manifestation of true love and wrote from Germany to her mother, A.N. Snitkina: “Anya loves me, and I have never been as happy in my life as I am with her. She is meek, kind, smart, believes in me, and made me so attached to her with love that it seems I would now die without her.”
Anna Grigorievna continued, throughout all fourteen years of marriage, to not betray the trust of the writer who was already tired of life - she was a devoted, patient and intelligent mother of his children, a selfless assistant and the deepest admirer of his talent. A businesslike, practical person, she was the complete opposite of Fyodor Mikhailovich, who was childishly naive in financial matters. She not only heroically protected her husband from troubles, but also decided to actively fight against many sometimes fraudulent creditors and extortionists.
Freeing her husband from the burden of financial worries, she saved him for creativity, and if we take into account that during their marriage all the great novels and the “Diary of a Writer” fell, that is, significantly more than half of what Dostoevsky wrote in his entire life, then it can hardly be overestimated her merits. Another thing is also important: through the hands of Anna Grigorievna, a stenographer and copyist, “The Player”, “Crime and Punishment”, “The Idiot”, “Demons”, “Teenager”, “The Brothers Karamazov”, “The Diary of a Writer” with the famous Pushkin speech were passed through. Anna Grigorievna was immensely happy that Dostoevsky dedicated his to her. This is a documentary recognition for the whole world of her enormous work.
In the year of Dostoevsky’s death, Anna Grigorievna turned 35 years old, but she considered her woman's life finished. When they asked her why she didn’t remarry, she was sincerely indignant: “It would seem blasphemy to me,” and then joked: “And who can you marry after Dostoevsky? - perhaps for Tolstoy! Anna Grigorievna devotes herself entirely to serving the great name of Dostoevsky and we can safely say that not a single writer’s wife has done as much to perpetuate the memory of her husband, to promote his work, as Anna Grigorievna has done. First of all, she published the complete (for those times, of course) collected works of Dostoevsky seven times (first edition - 1883, last - 1906), and also published several times whole line individual works writer. Of the “Dostoevsky” memorial works carried out by Anna Grigorievna, in addition to the release of his works, the most significant is the organization of a parish school named after F.M. in Staraya Russa. Dostoevsky for poor peasant children with a hostel for students and teachers.
Shortly before her death, Anna Grigorievna told doctor 3.S. Kovrigina: “Feelings must be handled with care so that they do not break. There is nothing more valuable in life than love. You should forgive more - look for guilt in yourself and smooth out roughness in others. Once and for all and irrevocably choose God for yourself and serve him throughout your life. I gave myself to Fyodor Mikhailovich when I was 18 years old. Now I’m over 70, and I still belong only to him with every thought, every action. I belong to his memory, his work, his children, his grandchildren. And everything that is even partly his is entirely mine. And there is and never was anything for me outside of this service...”
From the time Netochka Snitkina came to the writer’s apartment on October 4, 1866, there was not a single day in her life that she did not serve for the glory of Dostoevsky.
IN late XIX V. Anna Grigorievna begins work on creating her own memoirs dedicated to her life with Dostoevsky. In 1894, she began deciphering her shorthand diary of 1867. However, during her lifetime, Anna Grigorievna did not publish this diary, just as she did not publish either her memoirs or her correspondence with her husband, considering this simply immodest. But that’s not even important. The most important thing was that when Anna Grigorievna, having met with L.N. Tolstoy in February 1889, told him: “My dear husband was the ideal man! All the highest moral and spiritual qualities that adorn a person were manifested in him in the very high degree. He was kind, generous, merciful, fair, selfless, considerate, compassionate - like no one else!” - she was absolutely sincere. The further time passed, the more Dostoevsky remained exactly like this in her memory: when she began deciphering her shorthand diary abroad in 1894, and when she began to prepare her correspondence with her husband for publication, and when she began writing her own in 1911. "Memories". At the beginning of the twentieth century, the glory of Dostoevsky was added to this. It was then that Anna Grigorievna fulfilled her long-standing dream: she created at the Moscow historical museum“Museum in Memory of Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky” and publishes.
Anna Grigorievna confessed to her first biographer L.P. Grossman: “I don’t live in the twentieth century, I stayed in the 70s of the nineteenth. My people are the friends of Fyodor Mikhailovich, my society is the circle of departed people close to Dostoevsky. I live with them. Everyone who works to study the life or works of Dostoevsky seems like a dear person to me.”
The young composer Sergei Prokofiev, who wrote an opera based on Dostoevsky’s novel “The Gambler,” seemed just as close to Anna Grigorievna. When they said goodbye - it was January 6, 1917 - S.S. Prokofiev asked her to write something for his memorial album, but warned her that the album was on the theme of the sun and she could only write about the sun in it. Anna Grigorievna wrote: “The sun of my life is Fyodor Dostoevsky. A. Dostoevskaya."
Until her death, Anna Grigorievna worked on continuing her bibliographic index and dreamed of only one thing - to be buried in St. Petersburg, in the Alexander Nevsky Lavra, next to Dostoevsky. But it so happened that Anna Grigorievna died in Yalta on June 9 (22), 1918. Fifty years later, her grandson, Andrei Fedorovich Dostoevsky, fulfilled her last wish - he transferred her ashes from Yalta to the Alexander Nevsky Lavra. On Dostoevsky’s grave, on the right side of the tombstone, you can now see a modest inscription: “Anna Grigorievna Dostoevskaya. 1846-1918".
To speak of a great writer, a world-class classic, one of the greatest masters of thought as a lover, a husband and a man with “sexual oddities” is, to put it mildly, not easy. Firstly, it is incredibly difficult to overcome piety. And secondly, the topic itself is too “dangerous” - when you call a spade a spade, the words become ponderous and rude, and it is difficult to observe the measure if we're talking about about such a brilliant and sick individual as Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky.
Singer of monstrous erotica?
Many of his character traits and life events continue to remain mysterious and inexplicable. Only a few friends knew the real truth about him. In his novels and stories, he spoke so excitedly about the secrets, failures and madness of sex, so persistently brought out sensualists, molesters and debauchees, so soulfully painted “infernal” (fatal) and sinful women, that the question quite naturally arises: where did his exceptional knowledge of the heavy, sometimes monstrous eroticism of his incensed heroes and heroines? Did he create this whole world of passions, crimes and retribution, upsurges of the spirit and the madness of the flesh from observations, fantasies or his own experience? Who and how did he love and what was Dostoevsky like as a husband and lover? Perhaps some things in this story will seem implausible or unlikely to you, but Dostoevsky was much more complex than any of his heroes. A brilliant epileptic who went through the terrible trials of death, hard labor, poverty and loneliness, a pathological lover and a restless seeker of holiness, he lived a unique, fantastic life.
First love
Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky grew up in a family over which his despot father had unlimited power. Hot-tempered, gloomy and suspicious, he reached pathological exaggerations in his grievances and fantasies. Mikhail Andreevich was capable of accusing his wife of infidelity in the seventh month of pregnancy, and then painfully experiencing his doubts. His outbursts of anger were almost equally painful. All the signs of duality and neurosis, which later appeared in his son, are clearly visible in Doctor Dostoevsky. It is likely that they caused terrible disease- epilepsy. His mother died when Fedor was not yet sixteen years old. That same year he and his older brother were sent to the St. Petersburg Engineering military school. The teenager Dostoevsky was withdrawn and timid, he had neither “manners”, nor money, nor a noble name. If his peers boasted about their knowledge of the secrets of love, gained in the arms of serf girls and St. Petersburg prostitutes, then Fyodor could only remain silent. After it was finished with grief educational institution Dostoevsky immediately resigned and took up writing. It was the only way earn a living: at eighteen he was left an orphan with a bunch of younger brothers and sisters. At the age of 24, with the success of the story “Poor People,” the doors of St. Petersburg salons opened for Dostoevsky. At the writer Ivan Panaev's place, he meets his wife, Avdotya Yakovlevna, and falls head over heels in love. Three months later, Dostoevsky writes to his brother: “I am seriously in love with Panaeva... I am sick with nerves and am afraid of a fever or a nervous fever.” The first love was painful and ended humiliatingly. The 22-year-old brunette beauty Panaeva did not pay any attention to the thin, blond, nervous young man with a sickly complexion, but became the mistress of Nikolai Nekrasov, who was more persistent, richer, and more famous. Well, she can be understood... Nevertheless, one should not think that the unhappy lover was a complete virgin. By his own admission, Fyodor did not refuse to participate in friendly revels, and noisy evenings usually ended in brothels. At the age of 24, Dostoevsky wrote: “I am so dissolute that I can no longer live normally, I am afraid of typhus or fever, and my nerves are bad,” and also: “Minushki, Klarushka, Marianna, etc. have become extremely prettier, but they cost terrible money "The other day Turgenev and Belinsky scolded me to dust for my disorderly life."
But literary success very quickly gave way to failure. Neither the public nor the critics liked the next work, “The Double.” Dostoevsky "went to the bottom." Nikolai Strakhov, a biographer and close friend of Dostoevsky, said that the description of the youth of the hero of “Notes from Underground” is very autobiographical: “At that time I was only 24 years old. My life was gloomy, chaotic and wildly lonely... At home I am most of all I read, but at times I got terribly bored... I wanted to move, and I suddenly plunged into dark, underground, disgusting not debauchery, but debauchery... The outbursts were hysterical, with tears and convulsions... I debauched myself alone, at night, in secret , fearfully, with shame that did not leave me in the most disgusting moments... I was terribly afraid that they would somehow not see me, would not recognize me... I walked through the darkest places..."
By the age of 28, Dostoevsky became interested in utopian socialism, joined Petrashevsky’s circle, and from there, after terrible torture imaginary execution - to hard labor, where he met his first wife.
